this is where they go and what they do
by edeabeth
Summary: (emma runs away and Killian pursues, Henry struggles as the author and slowly people are coming to terms.) (implied abuse) (set after season four)
1. Chapter 1

this is where they go and what they do

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(emma runs away and Killian pursues, Henry struggles as the author and slowly people are coming to terms.)

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So, in other words- I loved the end of the season.

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(they are more than stories, they are the truth.)

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An island of stone sat far from the shore. A large tower dominated the small island, guarded by jagged rocks surrounding the lonely place.

Killian sat alone on the docks, gaze fixated on the dark tower. Occasionally lightning broke against the horizon as dark waves crashed against the beach. He wondered what the inside looked of the tower, whether she'd filled it and what she was doing. What possibly restrained the dark one from wandering free over Storybrooke, darkness corrupting everything that she ever was.

He took out the flask of rum from his pocket as Henry sat down next to him. He looked tired as he held a journal tight in his grip. "Mom'll be okay," he said. "Good always overcomes." He flipped through the pages of the book. Good always overcomes was written in the boy's elegant script. The writing was small and numerous, filling up every inch of space on the thick cream paper.

Killian smiled thinly. "Don't suppose you and that might pen can fix this, can you?"

"The author can't interfere," he mumbled. "I'm sorry."

"Not you, mate. Bleeding Rumpelstiltskin. He's the reason for all of this, isn't he?"

The man had become a saint overnight, it seemed. His entire store had been emptied in his desire to return everything stolen from the town. Belle had been persistent in her need to nurse him, fetching tea and an ensuring that Rumple rested despite that the damage had been removed. He was cured from centuries of grief and terrible actions, leaving a man feverish in love.

"I miss her. Grandma and gramps are different now, and even mom is being distant again."

"Aye, Swan has a habit for making people miss her, it seems. But, if anyone can beat the Dark One, Emma will."

Henry thinks back to the tower in the other reality, how her eyes had been wild in despair. The redness of her wrists, the exhaustion in her thin frame. "She's tired. Or, she was tired. Mom can only take so much before she breaks."

"We'll be there to pick her back up," Killian swore. "We'll always be there." Not running away from her and leaving her out to hang, he thought with bitterness. "Don't worry there, Emma will return. She'll return with a golden heart."

He looked up at the pirate thoughtfully. "Do you think Mom'll glitter?"


	2. Chapter 2

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(you must stop the darkness)

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She howled as she fought against the chains.

They broke open old scars and made her bleed anew. People appeared, shimmering and see through. Regina waved at her with a sick glee while Neal turned his back on her all over again. They made her hurt and sob, choking on smoke. Hook appeared the most, always just out of reach. Emma begged for him to say something, her eyes burning with tears.

He never did though, always quiet and always drifting from her.

The storm was part of her, she realized on some level. The more she fought against her own trap the more thunder rolled and the sea churned. Before her was a large window, view broken by bars. Emma could see the town, could see Killian's ship docked at the shore.

She could see her entire family safe before her.

The relief that the image brought crippled the hatred growing within. No matter how much Henry's angry words burned her, no matter how many times she saw her family toss her into a wardrobe-she always remembered how to love.

(even when foster fathers pulled at her clothes and foster mothers whipped her back raw.)


	3. Chapter 3

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(I'll make my own damn ending, thank you very much.)

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"You look fat," Regina informed Zelena with a smile. "How is your homey little nook?"

The woman looked at her with sharp green eyes. "If you had a moment or two, I would prefer some pillows of some sort. I find the lodgings rather uncomfortable in my state of being." She patted her rounded belly tenderly. "I suppose you're quite angry, aren't you?"

She rolled her eyes. "I'm always angry."

Zelena hesitatingly patted her hand gently before yanking it away. "I deserve that."

She shrugged. "Not really. You were a pawn to Gold. He had your heart, didn't he? Except he returned everything back to their proper owners. Hell, you never had a chance from birth."

"I'd rather been able to keep out of your lives after that disastrous incident previous. Unfortunately, my heart wasn't quite in it." She smiled sharply. "I was done feeling green with envy with everyone."

"You just made two jokes. My, my. You must be bored in here."

"I have a question for you," Zelena asked very quietly. She turned her gaze to the small fraction of a window. "What was mother like?"

Regina watched her very carefully before unbuttoning her shirt with hands that to their credit, hardly trembled. Zelena looked curious at her actions, scrutinizing the woman pull the fabric down to reveal angry puckered scars that rested over her heart. "She wanted a child who would be stronger than even she. I tried to run away so many times as a child before she married me away, after killing someone very dear to me."

She stood up from the bench and nodded at Zelena. Vanishing in a cloud of purple smoke, pillows of all sizes took her place.

Zelena smiled as she hugged a velvet green one tightly to her chest.


	4. Chapter 4

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(when you find true love, you fight tooth and nail for it.)

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Every morning at exactly a quarter after eight, Belle made tea.

She made it very carefully, pouring chilled water into the kettle the way her mother always showed her. _Patience makes the finest cup of tea_ , she had promised every time she poured a cup of tea. Belle often repeated the worn words to herself as she did so, scooping out loose leaf tea with a silver spoon. The aroma of roses and lemons drifted through the kitchen.

"I don't suppose I'll ever be able to convince you to sleep in a bit, will I?" Rumple voiced suddenly from behind her. He stood in the doorway, leaning heavily against the frame of the door.

"I'm supposed to be looking after you," she informed him sharply, "and you're supposed to be resting."

He shuffled closer, slippers scuffing against the floor. "I'm just fine, Belle."

She shrugged. "Isn't every day you get the Dark One ripped out of your chest, you know. Can you just try and take it easier a few days more?"

Rumple sighed as he wrapped his arms around her tightly. "Knowing that I am free is enough. Knowing that you're willing to give me another chance is more than enough." He smiled faintly. "You know, I once believed I would be damned to wander the realms alone. Always so close to people but always so far away."

"And now look at you," Belle teased, "you're a grandfather, and with Henry you get everyone."

"Emma," he whispered, face crumpling. "She wasn't ready for any of it."

Belle whirled around, ignoring the low roar of the kettle. "You don't talk like that. You had no choice in anything that happened. I chose to get help, and the Dark One chose to try and devour Regina. Emma couldn't help but be the saviour."

"She looked in the face of evil and embraced it," Rumple whispered into her hair. "It tortures you, in the beginning. Unless you accept everything that the power brings, it'll try to cripple you. Mirages will torment her, memories will come to life. She will feel every bit of pain until she decides to allow the Dark One full control."

"And then what?"

"It'll numb her. Slowly she will vanish, and quickly she'll lose control. Morals don't matter quite as much when evil is manipulating your judgement. I killed a king once because he raised the taxes on the villages suffering from a drought. I could have done something different, like turn the grass to gold."

Belle shook her head, "Magic always comes with a price. What damage would the gold have done to their lives?"

The kettle began screeching. "Love, I think I need to lie down."


	5. Chapter 5

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(good must always come first.)

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The author sat alone in the jail cell and Snow White watches him. She flipped through the pages of her book slowly. "I wonder, if you could have rewritten this, what you would have done." She called out in a delicate voice.

Isaac leaned to catch sight of the spine. _Romeo and Juliet_. "Easy. I would have let Juliet fall in love with Paris, and Romeo would have left."

Her lips quirked. "That might have been a better read."

He scowled at her. "How long are you going to sit there, radiating goodness while your daughter has become a monster of her own making?" His words are meant to burn and destroy the woman with pale skin and dark hair before him. He doesn't quite understand how worn she is, how angry words from people who mean so little to her dissolve into nothing. She'd spent years living in the wilds, Regina trying to kill her. She'd seen lives ripped apart and petty words from a monster lurking behind bars mean nothing.

"My daughter will never be a monster." Snow White smiled at him with her teeth. "She's better than all of us."

"Only because of what you did. Throwing that other girl away."

She rolled her eyes. "Emma is capable of terrible things. She's also capable of love. So are all of us."

"The Dark One will turn her into a raging monster, wanting to burn you at stake. She'll peel off your skin, rip it off your bones. She could destroy you all!"

"She could," Snow White shrugged. "Emma could do many dreadful things. Similar to how I could bash your damn skull in, snap your fingers and drown you in gasoline. I won't though."

She gave him another smile before flipping the page of her book.

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	6. Chapter 6

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(you will never find yourself. the day you are completed is the day that you will die.)

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Henry held the book close to his heart.

He'd already snapped the pen that caused so much grief and despair. On doing so, the Apprentice had bestowed upon him a new pen. It was a brilliant fountain pen that flowed golden ink. "It'll never die as long as you believe," he'd told him very quietly. "It will fare well beneath your grip."

"I don't know what to do with any of this," he admitted. "I've been writing and trying to help Emma, but nothing works."

The Apprentice sighed. "That is because Emma is caught between both good and evil. She will fight until her last breath, and nothing you try to change will fix it. Your writing is to capture the lives and create an honest record of everything that transpires. Both the good and the evil."

"Why?"

"There is no personal gain in doing this. What you are doing is creating history at the footfalls of the world. The moment a man goes for his sword; both a decision and a consequence are formed. You will be there to hold record of all this." The older man smiled at the boy. "You are surrounded by the dying and the living. Their lives have all been woven amongst one another."

"I think I understand."

"I hope so. Apparently, the one previous to you hadn't." Henry felt as if the Apprentice meant for his words to be taken as a joke but they came across bitterly.

He began drawing tiny circles in the corner of the page set in front of him, the older man seated across the table from him. "Do you have a real name?"

"Why?"

"The Apprentice is sort of a mouthful."

He chuckled. "Old friends called me Mickey once."

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	7. Chapter 7

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(moving on means letting go and unfortunately no one has ever manage to let go of anything.)

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"Henry's running around doing biographies," David said as he sat down next to Killian. The pirate was once again seated at the docks, watching the waves crash around the jagged rocks guarding the tower. "He'll be wanting to get yours soon enough."

"Better hope he has an entire blank book ready," he muttered. "Suppose I can squeeze in a fact of his granddad stabbing his mother's suitor?"

David winced before Killian clapped him on the shoulder. "I feel bad about that."

"You were James then, and from what I've been told-no offense to you or anything- but James sounded to be a bit of a prick." Killian informed him as he passed over the flask of rum. "Do you think she's alright?"

Thunder rumbled. "It's been weeks since it happened." David said. "I keep expecting her to be home. Saying something snarky and sneaking pop tarts past Snow. Except since she's been gone, the sun was ripped from our lives."

"Literally, mate."

"If anyone can handle something like this, it'll be her."

"At what cost though?"

David made a face as he swallowed the rum. "What she said to you, before she did the unspeakable-"

"I never got a chance to even tell her," he whispered. "She just went off and vanished."

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	8. Chapter 8

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(sometimes you have to howl to be heard.)

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Ruby still remembered the dungeons. None of it had been real, just an illusion of a warped reality.

Her flesh still prickled remembering the silver.

"You feelin' up to working today?" Granny asked as she plopped a plate of waffles down on her desk. She cast a narrowed gaze around the messy bedroom, eying the stilettos resting in the middle of the floor, surrounded by both clean and dirty laundry. "Diner's yours, you know."

She shrugged as she hunched over a sheet of graph paper. Lines formed and crossed, mimicking the ones drawn previously. They older designs had been pinned to the wall and others had been scattered around her desk chair. "Been busy."

"Doing what? Maid service?"

"Making arrangements for the next full moon," Ruby said very calmly despite how much she wanted to sob.

Granny rolled her eyes. "You gotta do better than that. You're putting too much support at the base, but none at the corners of that contraption." She prodded the plate a bit closer. "Anyways, what do you need this blasted cage for? You can control it. Risky methods, but you can do it."

"I didn't, then. I wasn't able to do it. The Queen had me hunted," Ruby sighed as she stabbed the fluffy waffle with her fork before sawing it violently with a knife. "The put me in a dungeon of silver. King Midas was there, but it was different. He made silver, not gold."

Granny placed her hand delicately down on her shoulder. "You're getting up out of that chair and going for a run. After, you're going to go see your friends. Then, you and I are going to burn all this wasted paper." She told her sharply. "What happened or what didn't happen, lord knows I barely understand it, happened. But we're gonna change it."


	9. Chapter 9

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(when you go hunting after evil, better be prepared for what you will become.)

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Keith grinned as he unbuttoned her shirt. Emma thrashed in the grip of the chains, metal burn her flesh. "Get off of me!" She screeched as he grabbed her by the neck. His grip made her gasp and wheeze, other hand wandering over her body.

"Call me Daddy, sweetheart. It'll make me real happy." He said warmly. "It is in your best interest to make me happy."

The ground shook beneath her feet. The faint sun vanished completely beneath the thrashing storm. "I have already have a father," she ground out firmly. "Get your damn hands off me before I crush you damn skull!"

"You didn't do the dishes," Carol informed her sharply. "You missed the pot on the stove."

Emma cried out as she remembered the heavy black pot. She'd been unable to lift it, the weight of it too much for her tiny stature. "I'm sorry!" she said as her heart pounded. "I didn't mean to!"

The tower quivered as a belt cracked against her back. Children appeared with narrowed eyes, complaining of lost toys she had never touched. Graham died in front of her and his shoes laces wrapped themselves intently around her neck. "You're pathetic," David seethed while Snow White slammed the door shut. "You lied to me," Henry told her with shame, "told me my dad was dead!"

She looked away from her world crumbling to see a ship nearing the tower.

"No!" Emma shouted as she forced the waves to pull at the boat. _Take the ship back safely,_ she thought before forcing a surge of magic through her body. She squeezed her eyes shut tight as Keith pressed a cigarette to her shoulder. She missed the image of a man lunging from the Jolly Roger, plunging into the rolling surface of the water. As Ruth smacked her hands with a wooden spoon she missed the sight of a drenched man pull himself up onto the rocky shore.

Suddenly Killian was before her, roaring as he jabbed his sword through Carol. A belt hit the floor, tarnished by her blood. "Bloody demons, all of you!" He shouted as he began slaughtering all of the images before. " _You_ ," he seethed as the sight of Keith toughing Emma. His narrowed eyes made Emma cringe, crying out.

Suddenly Keith turned to dust, a sword having pierced his chest.

"Emma, love," Killian choked out as he touched her cheek with his wet hand. "How long?"

She cried out wordlessly, back arching. Her skin faintly glimmered silver. "You need to-" she struggled to distance herself from him, "get away from me!"

"Fat chance, lass. Either you magically undo those fancy cuffs, or I will take a swing at them." He threatened as he carefully did the buttons of her shirt up carefully with one hand. Her form was smaller than he remembered, bruised and burned, covered in blood. "I'm taking you home."

"I'm going to hurt you all!" She protested as she fought against the chains. "I can't let that happen!"

He took out a very narrow and small knife from his pocket, jiggling it around the lock. Suddenly the cuff opened and the rest turned to ash. "Imagine that," Killian grinned. "Just like magic!"

It was easy to pick her up in his arms. No matter how powerful she was, torture had made her weary and frightened. He hummed lightly as he walked down the steep stairs, pressing his lips to her forehead every so often to ensure that she knew that he was real and he was going to fight for her.

The storm had faded away into blue skies and fluffy crowds. Killian whistled and suddenly the Jolly Roger began sailing towards the island of stone. He stood there waiting patiently. "A ship always goes running for her captain," he told Emma gently. "A ship is meant to be the captain's home. He will eat, drink and sleep amongst the walls and it will guide him through storms. Except, the Jolly Roger stopped being my home a while ago. To be very precise, I'd imagined it was when we climbed that bleeding overgrown bean stock."

She looked up at him with a pale face. "I don't want to hurt you," she whispered brokenly. "I saw things, everything."

"I killed those monsters, Swan, and I'll do it again. They were lies. Anyone who is smart enough to understand that they would be damn stupid to just let you go."

"Everyone did," Emma told him. "Everyone."

"Did I?"

She trembled. "You watched them hurt me."

Killian tightened his grip on her. "No, a lie watched you hurt me. Me, I'm awfully heroic lately. You might have been preoccupied by me making my way through a damn storm to get to your side, but I did it. And I'll do it again to save you."

They boarded the Jolly Roger together. He wrapped her in blankets and let her sit in the sun, in perfect view of where he stood directing the ship back to shore. The blankets turned red and he smelled rust in the air.


	10. Chapter 10

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(happy endings have a cost)

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"Damage done by the Dark One can never just disappear. She'll suffer everything she feels until she heals." Rumple said mournfully as he looked up the loft. "Emma is one who protests against bedrest, isn't she?"

Snow gave a trembling smile. "Of course she does. Why make things easier? Isn't one morning she isn't trying to leave this apartment."

"Sounds familiar," Belle teased lightly.

In the loft rested Emma, tucked beneath blankets. Killian sat diligently, guarding her from both harm and from her attempts to creep out of bed. They had tried playing cards, which had shown to be pointless, as they both cheated each other to the point Snow had to remove the deck of cards to stop the two from fighting over honor and such.

"You haven't slept much," Emma noted as she looked up at Killian. He looked exhausted, wearing a blanket like a cape around him.

"Someone has to keep you from running around like a lunatic," he shot back. "I'm not letting you go sprinting off."

Emma gave him a faint grin. "You calling me crazy?"

"As a hatter."

She reached for the piece of paper that Henry had written for her. He'd been running all over town in his attempts of recording all their lives. Within his journal came Granny's lasagna recipe and Regina's father's life story. He'd recorded how many arrows Robin had ever shot and he kept tally of how many times Neal cried at night. Belle had given him a list of her favorite books while Rumple had him transcribe the price of magic.

 _Emma Swan found her family._

Five words made her heart falter every time.

Killian yawned, catching her attention. "You're being an idiot," she informed him before shifting over in her bed. Within moments she was up on her feet. He jumped to his own and pointed at the bed.

"What do you think you're doing?" He demanded loudly.

"Either you take a nap here, or I'm going for a stretch."

They watched each other carefully. Since the tower she had become wary. She flinched when people moved to quickly and David learned to stop wearing a belt in her presence. Loud sounds made her uncomfortable. Killian had kept his distance while keeping presence under the reasoning that she was crazy and he'd never feel right unless he knew she was alright.

"Here?" He asked.

She pointed at the rose printed sheets mutely.

Killian carefully removed his hook while carefully keeping his handless arm to his side. The hook was placed on the night stand. Emma delicately touched his arm with her hand. "I'm not scared of seeing it, you know."

"Maybe I'm the one scared of you seeing."

"You shouldn't be," she shrugged before slipping into the bed feeling dizzy and worn out. Magic sparked at her finger tips before the feeling faded. Killian carefully slipped beneath the sheets next to her, arranging themselves to ensure that he had her carefully in his grip, his hook within easy reach and her fingers laced together with his. "Afraid I'll sneak off?"

"I know you, Swan. You're a damn liar at playing solitaire."

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	11. Chapter 11

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(you'll recover but you'll never heal)

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Zelena remains pregnant but Regina and Robin get married at the end of the month, Henry as the best man.

Ruby runs free as the wolf while Granny keeps making her waffles in the morning. Emma doesn't run away again, and slowly they start to plan to free her from the Dark One. She doesn't quite heal, her wrist still bare scars and she'll never stop skirting around people's touches. Killian always follows though, always within reach. Isaac lives within a cage, surrounded by heroes.

 _The end,_

Henry wrote.


End file.
